Congregation this evening will open the living and eternal never-changing and always helpful word of God to 2nd Chronicles 2nd Chronicles chapter 7 We're gonna begin our reading at verse 12 of 2nd Chronicles Chapter 7 and go through verse 16, but our text will be and I think it's fair to say the well-known As you will see, verse 14. Then also to the Heidelberg Catechism tonight, continuing and taking up questions and answers 116 and 117. The Heidelberg Catechism, finding those on page 252. questions and answers which might properly be called an introduction to prayer as we begin turning our attention now and thinking about uh... covenant prayer and the work of our mediator in that and our response and responsibility as we'll begin to take it up tonight so we'll give an answer to questions one sixteen one seventeen page two fifty two in just a moment First again, 2 Chronicles 7 and we begin at verse 12. Then the Lord appeared to Solomon by night and said to him, I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice. When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people. If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to prayer made in this place. For now I have chosen and sanctified this house, that my name may be there forever, and my eyes and my heart will be there perpetually." Thus far, beloved, the reading of God's glorious Word will pay attention especially to verse 14. But let's take up now the summary of the teaching of the Word of God as we find it in the Heidelberg Catechism, page 252. The first two questions and answers of Lord's Day 45. So give an answer to this, dear Christian. Why do Christians need to pray? Because prayer is the most important part of the thankfulness God requires of us, and also because God will give His grace and Holy Spirit only to those who continually and with heartfelt longing ask God for these gifts and thank Him for them. How does God want us to pray so that He will listen to us? First, we must pray from the heart to no other than the one true God who has revealed himself to us in his word, asking for everything he has commanded us to ask of him. Second, we must fully recognize our need and misery so that we humble ourselves in God's majestic presence. Third, we must rest on this unshakable foundation. Even though we do not deserve it, God will surely listen to our prayer because of Christ our Lord as He has promised us in His Word. These things, again, dear congregation, the Word of God does teach to us and therefore we do believe. Let's pray asking His help as we continue tonight. Our Father in Heaven, how kind and merciful you are to us to give us the whole counsel of Scripture, the whole counsel of God. And we need every chapter, every book, every word. We pray, Lord, this evening that as we take up this text, maybe well known to us, at least in certain ways, that we will see for our delight and help your love of the prayers of your people and our great help in laying all those petitions before you. Bless now your church and these things by your spirit. We pray Lord again, especially by your spirit tonight. Asking in Jesus name. Amen. Well, their congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, it might surprise us that the catechism mentions. In answer 117. By way of a proof text or a supporting scripture text. about prayer, this actual text of which we're very familiar. It might surprise us because undoubtedly, or at least maybe I'm making this assumption, that we have heard 2 Chronicles 7.14 misused more often than rightly used. But this grand and clear and very helpful text has place in our life. Just because people misuse this or that Bible verse does not mean, therefore, that we should shy away from it and think it has no use for us. Covenant family, we must understand, we must understand that the old covenant people of a particular place, the temple, really were the people of a particular person, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's who we are. Being called by His name has always meant being in Jesus Christ, for He has always been the only mediator between God and men. So, His people, called by His name, pray. Christians pray. Let's begin this evening seeing both why we pray and how we pray. The thankful, humble Christian has begun prayer that will end well. The thankful, humble Christian has begun prayer that will end well. We're going to see that in the following four ways this evening, always thinking about this being his people. So first of all, being his people means we know what it is to have received grace. Secondly, being his people means we know we must pray earnestly and legitimately. Third, being his people means we know we have been heard because of our mediator. Lastly, being his people means we know he will send the best for body and soul. The thankful, humble Christian has begun prayer that will end well. We are his people. And that means we know what it is to have received grace. Now, in thinking about the history of the passage before us in just some very broad terms and setting somewhat of the context, we know that Solomon has diligently used the resources accumulated by his father David to construct a grand place, a location, as we can think about this from this morning, for the presence of God called the temple. Solomon knew something by the wisdom for which he asked of God, and God granted him that wisdom, so Solomon knows that the people must remember that this covenant relationship in which they are is by grace. It is a gracious covenant relationship in which they are in. God chooses to interact with his people and through means, the work of mediation, he hears his people. He hears His people and comes to His people and helps His people. And beloved, if we think that is something relegated or limited in some real and practical ways to the old covenant administration, then of course we have missed the whole development of the covenant, haven't we? Through the work of mediation of the Lord Jesus Christ, He hears us. He comes to us. He helps us. Now, in terms of the old covenant work of mediation via bulls and goats and such, those things always, as we know, pointed ahead to the work of the mediator, Jesus Christ. When such people, mediated people, reconciled people, pray then, as the catechism teaches us, it is an act of thanksgiving. The very idea of having our sins mediated and being forgiven and being reconciled all push us to understand that at a core and an essential level, Thanksgiving is a primary aspect of our relationship with God. And so covenant family prayer, and you'll find this again in your fill in the blanks prayer. Is first and foremost an action. It is first and foremost an action. that says, thank you for saving me by sending Jesus Christ. Now, prayer is certainly more than saying thank you, but the catechism instructs us that it is truly not prayer unless it is first that. It is first saying thank you for grace received. Well, believers, I think we don't need to be convinced, but we need to say it in this way because the catechism is moving us here as an introduction into prayer. Maybe we don't need to say that prayer is vital. Do we need to say that? Is it the case that there are supposed Christians who do not pray on a regular basis? How many days or hours or maybe weeks can you go without, in a consecrated, devoted, assertive way, set aside all else and say, I need to be in prayer with my God. Now, why do we do that? Why is it key for us? You see what the catechism is asserting here? We do so first because we are so very thankful. Now tonight, Thanksgiving of 2019 is behind us. But for the Christian, Thanksgiving doesn't need a holiday to be its source of expression. The Catechism says that God requires thankfulness of us. I think that language is very helpful because it puts each of us again into the position of a child. I bet it is the case with you and your parenting or you as you remember being parented that there's that Constant need for instruction from the parent to the child. When the child receives something nice or some kind work is done for them, the parent says to the child, now what do you say? Oh, thank you. It's a basic thing, isn't it? Well, why do we use that kind of language? Because we know that we have received a gift or we've been helped in some way that was of absolute necessity for us. And so the most natural thing, the first thing is to say thank you. So covenant family, we're going to repeat this because I think it needs to be settled again in our hearts. We need not make this overly complicated. Those Christians who pray are saying thank you to God for saving them. But that Thanksgiving also looks at what else we need in terms of our daily supply And thanks God for daily grace worked in us by His Holy Spirit's ministry. And so we need to ask the question again. For what are you thankful, dear Christian? Have you learned that prayer is a part of the daily routine and the daily practice and the daily pattern of believers, of Christians? Do you say it to God? He's heard it from you lately, hasn't he? Where you go to your knees if you're able or in some way you set aside all other things and especially all distractions and you mute the phone and you turn off the TV and you silence the radio and whatever else and you say, Lord God, I'm going to spend this time with you in prayer because I am thankful. Now believers, that's first. Now we can go on, but not until that has gripped us. The catechism puts it in this language because prayer is the most important part of the thankfulness God, and this language hasn't changed in the various versions of the catechism, God requires of us. What have we received? How much has He blessed us? And do we say it? Thank you. Well, being His people means, secondly, we know we must pray earnestly and legitimately. 2 Chronicles 7.14, if my people, called by my name, humbling themselves, praying, seeking my face, you see the connectives there in the text, don't you? This is definitive, we might say, of heard and answered praying. These things are definitive of praying that is heard and praying that is answered. The catechism asks us, it may even seem to us an odd way of putting it in question 117, how does God want us to pray so that he will listen to us? So that he won't turn away from us in a sense. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways. Listen to something similar to that in Psalm 27, verses 7 and 8. And this, I think, will connect rather well with where we were this morning. This is Psalm 27, verses 7 and 8. The psalmist, hear, O Lord, when I cry with my voice. Have mercy also upon me, and answer me, When you said, the psalmist goes on, when you said, speaking of what the Lord said to him, when you said, Lord, seek my face, my heart said to you, your face, Lord, I will seek. This is praying, answer 117 of the catechism, from the heart to God alone. We pray only to God. seeking His face. This means we ask for what we know He is pleased to hear us ask for. It means we ask for what we know He is pleased to hear us ask for. We ask earnestly for legitimate things. Asking from the heart for all he has commanded us to ask for. That's how the catechism begins to answer that question from the heart for all he has commanded us to ask for. Covenant family proper covenant family proper asking in prayer. Is always from the heart. For things pleasing to God. And so again we. We seek to to understand our own hearts and so we ask diagnostic questions. How do I learn to pray from the heart? Do I understand what is involved in that? What does that mean? It means seeking the God you love, whom you know has loved you first. The God who you know from history has cared for you. You begin to accumulate your experiences, the things you've learned over the years, and you say, now I know God loves me. And I have this issue, or I have these concerns, I have these troubles, and my heart says, seek God's face. Your saved heart wants you to ask Him who saved you to continue saving you in that sense of your daily trials and difficulties. Your Holy Spirit-led, Holy Spirit-renewed heart wants you to pray. You feel you must pray. And when you pray, you ask God for what God wants you to be asking for. It's, it's laughable for people to say, Oh, you Christians think you can pray for a better house or you can pray for a lot more money. Well, those are straw men easily torn down by scripture. No, we pray for the true earnest believer praise for the things we know God wants us to be praying for. And so to that end, what does God want me to be praying for? We continue to read his word as we heard this evening in prayer. By coming to know Him through His Word and coming to know Him through His commandments and coming to know Him through the narratives of Scripture and the lessons given to us there, we begin to know more clearly what it is we should be asking for. And this is why it is always wise for younger believers to link up to an older believer. For those a little less mature, to ask someone a little more mature, should I be praying for this? How should I be praying about this situation? Run to one older and wiser than you and ask them. That's a wonderful request. They will love to hear that. And they will show you and lead you. But what if you, so far this evening, said no to any of this tonight? What if you said, well, I'm not spending much time in prayer. It isn't my first response to my dilemma. I don't have a daily or a regular patterned time of prayer. Is it the case if you're saying no about those sorts of things that you're not a Christian? Is that right? What if your prayers, you're thinking, though I've been trying, they seem to be coming from a cold heart. I've been praying in sort of a formal way. I'm going through the motions. I'm doing what I think I should be doing, but I'm not sure if God is hearing me. It's begun to become a little bit stock and repetitive and ritualistic. Is that an indication that I'm not a believer, beloved? No, in neither case is that an indication that you're not a believer. But there is a first response to both of those dilemmas. And it is the same response, and it is this. Pray on. Keep on. Continue in prayer. Beloved, there are those seasons. And it's true for every Christian. And you've gone through that if you've been a Christian for some time. Where sometimes you could pray, it seems like, for hours. And it's the most joyful thing you want to do. And then the next week, it's like you can barely pray at all. Oh, beloved, pray on. Don't stop. We're going to see some other things of necessity for confidence in prayer in a moment, but first, Quite simply this keep praying. Covenant family sometimes praying from the heart sometimes praying from the heart is no more glamorous than your heart telling your head. That I will pray. Because God told me in the Bible that I should be praying. Simply put, and beloved, we need to understand this about the Spirit-directed heart. The Christian heart says this, if God has told me to do something, that's what I'll do. We can be that simple. There is an aspect of our faith that is exactly that simple. God said that I should be doing this, and so I'll be doing it. And our hearts, dear ones, by the leading of the Holy Spirit, our hearts want fellowship and they want communion and desire that interest of nearness to God. And that's what praying really is. Seek His face. Know praying as seeking God's face. Well, being His people means, thirdly, we know we have been heard because of our Mediator. I want to ask you two other diagnostic questions this evening, and these diagnostic questions are often very helpful for us. It enables us in some way to gauge kind of where we're at individually and personally. So let me ask you two different diagnostic questions. Would you be a person to go up to a group of others if they're asking, and this is some amorphous group of 10 people who are asking about prayer in the Christian ministry, in the Christian life, and if they asked you, does God hear the prayers of his people? How would you answer that question? Would you say, yes, God hears the prayers of His people? With confidence you would assert that. You would say, yes, I know it from Scripture. I can see it all over the place. I've known it from the experiences of people in my congregation that God hears, listen to it again, the prayers of His people. That's the first question. How would you answer? But how about then this second diagnostic question? That same group of 10 people then turn to you and they look at you straight in the face and they say, does God hear your prayers? Now do you see the distinction there, beloved? How then would you answer? Me? My prayers? Does He hear me? How do I know if He hears me? Let me give you three ways. Three reasons why we know God hears our prayers. The first is this, and it is that we only pray through Jesus Christ who lives to make intercession for us. Is God hearing my prayer? Is He hearing me pray? If I know that my prayers are coming to Him because of the One who lives to make intercession for me, that's the first question to wrestle with. That's first. Answer 117 of the Catechism reminds me that the unshakable foundation to those who do not deserve to be heard is to have their prayers heard because of Jesus Christ. And the moment that is challenged most quickly in our lives, beloved, is when we have sinned, or when we have given way to some temptation, or when we are just basically distraught because of a situation in our life that we cannot answer to, and we say, oh God, will you hear my prayer? That's the moment to say, my prayer comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. But secondly, I know He hears me. Because I don't pray in boastful, pompous, demanding ways. Those are not the ways of the Christian in prayer. And so covenant family humility, covenant family humility in prayer is a natural, regular attitude for those who pray properly in Jesus' name. Why do we use the language regular and natural Because we know who we are as sinners. And we understand that because we are sinners, that humility is an important aspect of our praying. And that knowledge of our sin nature, it humbles me, it humbles us. That is, and think about it this way, you know those two men who went up to the temple to pray, right? And the one who said something about his condition being so much better than the other man, right? And then there's the one who beat his breast and not daring to look up to heaven, simply said, Lord have mercy on me, a sinner. That's right. That's the attitude. We don't say, God, see how worthy I am. I've come to church every service, both services, for weeks and months and years. You need to hear me. The Christian does not pray that way. There is rather a different attitude to say thank you for listening to a sinner such as I am. It's not me. I'm not the reason, but it is Jesus Christ. He's the reason. And despite me, because of Him, the holy and glorious God listens to me. But there is a third reason why we ought to be confident that God hears us. And that third reason builds on the first two. The first one was that I only pray through my mediator, Jesus Christ. And second, I pray in humility, knowing that I am a sinner, that I am only heard through my mediator, Jesus Christ. But then thirdly, I know he hears me because I am one who seeks to turn from my wicked ways. Notice this is a key and significant part of Second Chronicles 714. My people called by my name, humbling themselves, praying, seeking his face, and turning from their wicked ways. Covenant family, we will come to learn in a few Lord's days from now, we will come to learn in a few Lord's days from now, that our desire for his will to be done and our desire to turn from our wicked ways are one and the same desire. These are complementary interests within us. We say, Lord, your will be done. And we say, Lord, I want to be done with this sin. And we come to learn as we mature in the Christian faith that these two are two sides of the same coin, the inside and the outside of the same box. And prayer is essential in both of these things. That plea, Lord, your will be done, and its reciprocal plea, Lord, help me to turn away from sin, are found in those who pray. And as we mature in the Christian faith, we begin to learn how significant a part of prayer That kind of praying actually is. Lord, may your will be done, even as that means I need to repent, even as that means I need to change my ways. Lord, your will be done, even as that means I need to amend my longstanding rituals and traditions. I come to learn those things have sinful components to them, and I need to be turning away from them. Lord, your will be done. Amend my life. Renew me. The one who is confident about being heard while praying is the one seeking a holier life. It is integral, central, to even such a text as this one. Seek my face and turn from their wicked ways. Then I will hear from heaven and forgive their sin and heal their land. Being His people means, fourthly, we know He will send the best for body and soul. As we will soon see, the Lord's Prayer, which, again, these questions and answers are introductions to, the Lord's Prayer begins with the address, what? Our Father. This is simply a different way of saying what it is we are learning that we are saying in 2 Chronicles 7.14, namely that relationship matters. Our Father, we are your people. You are our Father in heaven. We are your children. You are the Lord. We are the servant. This relationship teaches us again why, question and answer 116, why it is that we ask Him for gifts which then we thank Him for. Well, which gifts? And this is the reason we did not include question and answer 118 tonight, when we think of the question which gifts ought we to ask Him for. You see, because 1.18 is going to go on and say everything we need spiritually and physically as it is braced in the prayer in Christ our Lord Himself taught us, and those things will show to us that it encompasses all things, but there are preliminary things which we find even in these introductory questions and answers. 1.16, which gifts? God will give His grace and Holy Spirit only to those, listen to it, only to those who continually and with heartfelt longing ask God for these gifts and thank Him for them. We can't receive the other gifts aside from first pleading to God for these gifts. 2 Chronicles 7.14, we need to confess our sins and find remedy for our defects. Covenant Family, our first need as Christians, is the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit within us to lead us to repentance and growth and sanctification. This is first, and it is what we need most. I put it this way that everything else we could possibly ask for from God would merely be a band-aid for brain cancer if we have not the work of the Holy Spirit in us, shaping us, molding us, and healing us. Ask the Father to fill you with His Holy Spirit, Isaiah 6 verse 10. These two questions and answers then serve, as we've been saying, as an introduction to the spiritual discipline, which is prayer. Now listen to that again. They serve as an introduction to the spiritual discipline, which is prayer. It's interesting, I think, that the authors of our catechism, Olivianus or Sinus, if you look at it carefully, They seem to be men in step with a particular camp of Reformed theologians and pastors who understood the significant necessity of a marriage emerging of head and heart, of knowledge and longing, of intellect and piety, in the best sense of that. And praying will always, you see, include both. Praying will include a knowing the God to whom we are speaking and a yearning to be heard by Him. Covenant family, we are blessed. We are blessed from Scripture and the Catechism to know that praying erupts from proper knowledge and a passionate heart. Amen. Our God and our Father, we praise You this evening. that we can this evening just begin to scratch the surface in terms of prayer. There is so much before us in that prayer that the Lord Jesus taught His church to pray. We need to understand prayer and we thank You that Your Word makes it very clear to us that we are Your people and Your people have always been those down through the ages who seek Your face. We pray. Help us this week, Lord, to make a decided effort and find a time and make a commitment to be engaged in the response to all of these things and be people of prayer. Grant mercy to us, Lord, as we make this beginning. We ask now for your help in Jesus' name. Amen.